If they protect their sacred mountain home, the Indians of northern Colombia believe they will keep the entire planet in balance. It's getting more and more difficult.

Get a taste of what awaits you in print from this compelling excerpt.

In a bloodstained continent, the Indians of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta were never truly vanquished by the Spaniards. Descendants of an ancient South American civilization called the Tayrona and numbering perhaps 45,000 today, the Kogi, Arhuaco, and Wiwa peoples fled death and pestilence four centuries ago, seeking refuge in a mountain paradise, whose peaks soar more than 18,000 feet above the Caribbean coast of Colombia. In the wake of the conquest they developed an utterly new dream of the Earth, a revelation that balanced the baroque potential of the human mind and spirit with all the forces of nature.

Separated by language but closely related by myth and memory, they share a common way of life and the same fundamental religious convictions. (A fourth group, the Kankuamo, also found protection in the Sierra Nevada, but they have now become more assimilated into Colombian society.) To this day the Kogi, Arhuaco, and Wiwa remain true to their ancient lawsthe moral, ecological, and spiritual dictates of the primordial creator, a force they identify as the Motherand are still led and inspired by a ritual priesthood. In an arduous process of initiation that can take up to 18 years, young acolytes are taught the values of their society, among them the notion that their spiritual work alone maintains the cosmic (or as we might say, ecological) balance.

When the priests, or Mamas, speak, they immediately reveal that their reference points are not of our world. They refer to the Spanish conquest as if it were a recent event. They talk openly of the force of creation, or Se, the spiritual core of all existence, and aluna, human thought, soul, and imagination. What is important, what has ultimate value, is not what is measured and seen but what exists in the many realms of meanings and connections that lie beneath the tangible realities of the world, linking all things. The nine-layered universe of their cosmology, the nine-tiered temple where they gather, the nine months a child spends in its mother's womb are all expressions of creation, and each reflects and informs the other. A hill can also be a house, the mountains a model of the cosmos. The white hats worn by Arhuaco men also symbolize the snowfields of the sacred peaks. The hairs on a person's body echo the forest trees that cover the mountain flanks. Every element of nature is imbued with higher significance, so that even the most modest of creatures can be seen as a teacher, and every feature of the world mirrors the whole.Wade Davis

In 1987to counteract the encroachment and communicate concerns to the worldthe Kogi, Arhuaco, and Wiwa groups formed an organization led by their spiritual leaders, or Mamas, to communicate with outsiders and exercise their indigenous rights enumerated in Colombia's constitution. The organization, called Gonawindúa Tayrona Indigenous Organization of the Mamas, enables them to convey their unique indigenous philosophy on land and environmental matters to the rest of the world.

Gonawindúa Tayrona actively negotiates with non-Indian settlers on the lower slopes of the massif, buying back ancestral Indian land so that the Indians can restore the natural jungle habitat, mending the ecological balance, and re-attracting animals like wild boars and birds. When the jungle grows back, Indians cultivate only small patches of the restored land in accordance with their belief system. With prayer and offerings, the Mamas conduct spiritual work to heal and revitalize these sites.

If you are interested in learning more about the organization and helping the Indians of the Sierra Nevada, contact the Gonawindúa Tayrona c/o Margarita Villafañe at: Carrera 19A No. 23-05Santa Marta, Colombia

Gonawindu Tayrona Organizationwww.tairona.orgOn this site view photographs taken by the Kogi, Arhuaco, and Wiwa of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, then learn more about the threats to their environment.

Tayrona Heritage Studies Centre www.lamp.ac.uk/tairona/b6sndesm.htmlExplore Kogi history and philosophy on this website created in part by BBC producer Alan Ereira, who made a film with the Kogi in the 1990s.